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Brett Martel

BATON ROUGE, LA. | After Charles Mann and Kenny Gaines turned in their latest memorable performances, the celebratory hollers of the Georgia Bulldogs could be heard through the door to the visitors’ locker room at LSU’s Pete Maravich Assembly Center.

The Bulldogs didn’t need to beat the Tigers to secure a top-four seed and coveted double-bye in next week’s Southeastern Conference tournament, but their motivation was more personal than that, and it showed on Saturday.

NEW ORLEANS — T.J. Yeldon is a man of many yards and few words, which so far has suited third-ranked Alabama quite well.

After this Thursday night's Sugar Bowl against No. 11 Oklahoma, though, some of the program's leaders, namely quarterback AJ McCarron, will be leaving school. Then Yeldon, whether he wants to or not, is expected to become the face of the Crimson Tide.

BATON ROUGE, La. — Freshman backup quarterback Anthony Jennings leaned into LSU’s huddle in the Tigers’ end zone and delivered one quick message before calling the first play of a pressure-packed, late-game drive.

“I said, ‘Let’s go. It’s time to go 99 yards,’” Jennings recalled. “There was no doubt in my mind we were going to do that.”

BATON ROUGE, La. — If Les Miles is worried about how his embattled defense will hold up against Johnny Manziel and Texas A&M’s relentless, up-tempo offense, he isn’t showing it.

The ninth-ranked Aggies’ visit to Death Valley on Saturday afternoon will feature two of the top quarterbacks in the Southeastern Conference, as well as some of college football’s best receivers and running backs — seemingly all the needed ingredients of a high-scoring affair.

LSU’s coach, however, said he is “not looking forward to that style of game.”

BATON ROUGE, La. — Les Miles figures it’s time to start tinkering with his lineups as LSU aims to strike a balance between winning and building for the future.

“First and foremost, it’s about victory, and that will not be overlooked,” Miles said Monday as the 13th-ranked Tigers, still reeling from an upset loss at Mississippi, began preparations for its homecoming game against Furman this Saturday night.

BATON ROUGE, La. — The depth of Odell Beckham Jr. and Jarvis Landry’s friendship can be seen whenever the LSU receivers eat out together.

Landry playfully pops a straw through the end of its wrapper and ceremoniously extends it to Beckham. It’s the same shtick employed by servers at the famous Camellia Grill, where Landry first ate while visiting with Beckham at his family’s uptown New Orleans home. Now it’s also an inside joke between arguably the best receiving tandem in college football.

METAIRIE, La. — Sean Payton and Drew Brees for years have referred to the Patriots as a model NFL franchise, and one worth emulating.

During the buildup to New Orleans’ visit to New England on Sunday, both clubs have showered one another with expressions of mutual respect. The praise appears genuine — there are similarities between the teams that don’t seem all that coincidental — and Payton says that Bill Belichick “has been someone certainly that I look up to.”

BATON ROUGE, La. — By the time Zach Mettenberger and the LSU Tigers had sealed up their latest victory over Auburn in their Southeastern Conference opener, they were too disappointed over their second-half slippage to celebrate their early dominance.

“Guys just didn’t keep their heads in the game,” Mettenberger said following Saturday night’s 35-21 victory. “We just let off the gas pedal. Hopefully this is a lesson that everybody learned.”